All posts by Ruben Parra

Chemistry and Diversity & Inclusion at DePaul University: A Metaphor

Traditionally, Colombia celebrates Chemist’s Day (El día del Químico) every year on October 31st. The Colombian Council of Professional Chemists organizes events or meetings to help celebrate the day (https://cpqcol.gov.co/eventos/dia-del-quimico/). In short, today is certainly a big day for chemists around the world, but especially in my home country, Colombia. On account of this day, and given my role not only as a chemist but also as the Associate Provost for Diversity and Inclusion at DePaul University, I feel very motivated to write this short blog post wherein I attempt to link chemistry and diversity, at least symbolically. Continue reading →

DePaul’s Mission in the Classroom

In common to most, if not all, teachers, I always commit myself to designing and carrying out successful teaching. In particular, I subscribe to the notion that teaching success correlates with students learning. Accordingly, part of my job as a teacher is to identify and facilitate ways of learning that best match the kinds of learning that needs to occur in my courses. Because there is no such thing as an all-purpose approach to teaching (or one-size fits all approach), I understand the need to maintain a life-long commitment to continuous improvement upon my teaching and learning. Thus, I intentionally make every effort to keep abreast with evidence-based developments on approaches to teaching and learning. For example, I regularly read journal articles and books related to teaching and learning. I attend the Annual University Teaching and Learning conference, the University Fall Forum, and other teaching and learning workshops. Among the many lessons I have learned is the critical role that the classroom climate has on students learning. Indeed, course climate has been suggested as a very important component in the design of effective instruction. For example, Ambrose et al. (2010) suggested seven principles for effective teaching based on literature research and their own teaching experiences. Two of these principles seem to explicitly connect learning with the climate of the course.

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Being an Effective Teacher (Part 2)

As part of my efforts to become a better and more effective teacher, I have immersed myself in the literature about effective teaching. I had two fundamental questions I wanted to find answers for or at least some insights about:

1) What does it mean to be an effective teacher?

2) What are some of the salient characteristics of an effective teacher?

In this blog, I would like to share with you part of what I have learned so far.

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Being an Effective Teacher (Part I)

I have played the role of a learner all my life.  I remember vividly many of my learning experiences typically involving a great deal of frustration and even pain but also an immeasurable  amount of ultimate joy and satisfaction. In first grade, for example, learning (or better, memorizing) the 10x multiplication tables was frustrating as it took me quite a while until I was able to carry out any of the multiplications in my mind without looking at the table. I thought of the time spent learning the multiplication tables as valuable time taken away from my fun activities such as playing with my friends or watching TV. Continue reading →

Reflections on my Experience in the Teaching and Learning Certificate Program

After having attended over a dozen workshops offered throughout DePaul’s Teaching and Learning Certificate Program (TLCP), I have developed a much better sense of what I can do as a teacher to affect a positive and measurable transformation in my students. I also learned that I am not alone in my quest to find innovative teaching practices that can be readily implemented in my courses.   Continue reading →

Making the Most Out of Office Hours

Having in mind the theme of our upcoming Annual Teaching and Learning Conference, “Full Contact Teaching: Making the Most of Class Time,” I reflected on what other student-faculty contact opportunities there are that could be used more effectively. I realized that in my experience more often than not office hours tend to be used non-effectively, or even worse not used at all by students. I firmly believe that office hours are a unique opportunity that I have to get to know better my students’ weak and strong points in the learning process, and then provide my students with proper and timely feedback. That is, office hours are certainly one avenue that a student has to provide me with valuable information that I can then use to help him/her better individually, and then the entire class at large. I thus decided some time ago to consider strategies that could help drive purposefully more students to my office hours. Of the many strategies that occurred to me, I will talk in this blog about one that I implemented with great success in the second quarter of general chemistry that I taught in spring of 2009 (CHE113, now known as CHE132). Continue reading →

Amazing Learning from Amazing People

A Selected Recollection of my Teaching and Learning Experiences

PART 1

Ever since I was a little boy, I have been blessed with plenty of opportunities for teaching to and learning from others both in academic and non-academic activities. Going back to my first grade times, I recall an assignment where I was asked to draw a traditional family picture: you know, dad, mom, children, and a dog. I was sitting in my study desk at home struggling with this assignment because I was (and still am) not a good illustrator at all. Then a friend of the family who was visiting us that day offered me his help. With his help, I was able to finish successfully the family picture. In his own ways, he taught me a few tricks regarding the drawing of a human face, and the contour of a typical dog. With his help, I was able to tackle later assignments involving drawing with much more confidence. As I learned from my friend, as artistic as drawing can be there are usually some basic steps that can be followed by anyone to end up with a decent picture or portrayal. What is remarkable about this story is that the person who helped me draw a family picture was himself a person who had a moderate degree of intellectual disability. Also in first grade, I remember one of my classmates having difficulties with reading and math, two subjects I was pretty good at. She asked me if I could help her and I gladly did so. Thus, here I was in first grade on the one hand struggling with drawing but improving thanks to somebody else’s help, and on the other hand having an opportunity to help a classmate in her struggles with reading and math. Continue reading →

Fostering a Culture of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) at DePaul

One of the central purposes given by DePaul University’s mission statement regards research broadly (emphasis mine):

Research is supported both for its intrinsic merit and for the practical benefits it offers to faculty, students, and society. Broadly conceived, research at the university entails not only the discovery and dissemination of new knowledge but also the creation and interpretation of artistic works, application of expertise to enduring societal issues, and development of methodologies that improve inquiry, teaching and professional practice.

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